A seven-year study on head injuries in infants, Iran---the changing pattern / 中华创伤杂志(英文版)

<p><b>OBJECTIVE</b>Head injury (HI) is the leading cause of mortality and life-long disability in infants. Infants have different anatomical and pathophysiological brain structures from other age groups. The aim of this study was to survey infant HI patients admitted to Shahid Behest Hospital in Kashan, Iran from 2004 to 2010, and to identify the causes of HIs in this age group.</p><p><b>METHODS</b>In this retrospective study, all HI patients under the age of two who were hospitalized for more than 24 hours between January 2004 and January 2010 were enrolled in the study. Demographic, etiologic, and injury data were collected and a descriptive analysis was performed.</p><p><b>RESULTS</b>Infants comprised 20.8% of all children (under 15 years old) with HIs and 65.1% of the injuries occurred in the home. Falls were the most common cause of injury (63.4%). In hospital mortality was 6.6 per 100 000 infants. A decreasing trend was seen in home events, but HIs caused by traffic accidents were increasing during the study period. The amount of HI infants resulting from car accidents has tripled from the years 2004 to 2010.</p><p><b>CONCLUSION</b>Although home events and falling are the main causes of infant HIs and need attention, our study showed an increase of HIs caused by road traffic accidents, especially by car accidents, thus legislation for the implementation of protective equipment such as child safety seats and programs is urgently needed.</p>

Relation between RNA sequences, structures, and shapes via variation networks

RNA plays key role in many aspects of biological processes and its tertiary structure is critical for its biological function. RNA secondary structure represents various significant portions of RNA tertiary structure. Since the biological function of RNA is concluded indirectly from its primary structure, it would be important to analyze the relations between the RNA sequences and their structures. One important tool to perform this kind of analysis is the neutral network which is a collection of RNA sequences, all coding the same secondary structure, where each RNA sequence is distinguished from the others by no more than a single base mutation. Another high level and useful representation of an RNA secondary structure is the RNA shape, where it is holding the vicinity and nesting of structural components and reducing their lengths to one unit. This allows us to analyze the huge structural space corresponding to the larger RNA sequences. In this study, a new concept, entitled Variation Network, over the set of all RNA shapes is introduced. Based on this concept, the potential relations between random and natural RNA sequences, as well as their corresponding structures are analyzed. To explore the relations between random and natural RNA sequences and their corresponding structures, different properties including frequency, normalized frequency, shape energy average, variation rate, normalized variation rate, neighborhood energy average, and stability were obtained and analyzed. The correlations among these properties of random and natural Variation Networks are presented. Base on the obtained correlations, all the employed datasets are highly correlated to each other from the frequency point of view, whereas they are not well correlated from the thermodynamic energy point of view. Since the thermodynamic energy value of an RNA sequence over its secondary structure plays a key role in its function, this research conclude that the natural RNA sequences are not generated randomly

Cisplatin resistant patterns in ovarian cell line using FTIR and principle component analysis

Cisplatin is a common chemotherapeutic agent that used for treatment of many solid cancers. Rapid identification of chemotherapy resistance is very important and may lead to effective treatment plan. Spectroscopy techniques, such as infrared spectroscopy, which are sensitive to biochemical composition of samples, have shown potentials to discriminate tissues. Developing in Fourier transform infrared [FTIR] as a diagnostic tool support conventional technique in investigating cell phenotype. By this goal three different cell lines, two cisplatin resistant OV2008-DDP [C13] and A2780-CP ovarian cell lines and one cisplatin sensitive A2780 cell line were investigated by FTIR spectroscopy. Data were subjected to principle component analysis [PCA] to obtain FTIR pattern for cisplatin resistance. Using FTIR spectroscopy on these cells in the range of 400-4000 cm[-1] was shown dramatic change in cells. Results shows that Cisplatin resistance pattern is characterized in spectrum with the alteration of conformation in secondary structure of proteins and a shift toward the high wave numbers of CH2 stretching vibration. The FTIR data set between 1000 and 3000 cm[-1] could be consumed as biochemical typicality spectra among resistant and sensitive cell lines while correctly classified by PCA model. Our work supports the promise of PCA analysis of FTIR data as a powerful combined approach for the development of automated methods to recognize resistant to cisplatin in experimental cell lines. One of the advantages of this tool is to investigate the resistant percent of cancer cells .Such technique may bring new tool in cancer diagnosis and stage definition in cancerous tissues